Irish Cenn Cruaich, 'Chief of the Mound,' into its etymological equivalents, in modern Welsh we have Pen Crûg,[1] which was written formerly Penn Cruc, while at a much earlier date, when the language still retained its case-endings, it must have had the form Pennos Crûci, or else that of a compound Pennocrûci.[2] This last, as the basis of an adjective relating to the god so-called, would yield the forms Pennocrûcjo-s, Pennocrûcja, Pennocrucjo-n; and the last mentioned, the neuter, actually occurs, namely, Latinized into Pennocrucium, which would accordingly seem to have meant a place associated with the god who was called Chief of the Mound, that is to say, a spot devoted to his worship. The station called Pennocrucium in the Itinerary of Antoninus[3] has been variously identified with Stretton and Penkridge, in Staffordshire; and the name Penkridge, written Pencrik,
- ↑ This would in its turn admit of two translations, according as one took pen to mean the top or end (in the physical sense) of the mound, or else the top, in the metaphorical sense of head or chief; and so far as I know, Pen Crûg or Pencrug as a modern Welsh place-name means nothing more than the Top of the Mound, the Mound's End, or the like.
- ↑ This compound is like Vassoccaleti (see note, p. 12), except that the qualifying element is a genitive and not an adjective; but this way of compounding words would seem to have fallen early out of fashion both in Welsh and in Irish, where we should otherwise have had Cenn Chruaich, and not Cenn Cruaich. Neta(-Ttrenalugos) has been mentioned at p. 12, but considerable irregularity prevails with regard to its later equivalent, nom. nia, gen. niad, as, for instance, in the case of the name Cairbre Nia-fer, Cairbro Champion of Men; for the nominative nia is found used for the crude form, which should be niad: thus in two passages cited in O'Curry's MS. Mat. pp. 507, 513, Nia-fer has to be construed as a genitive, while the Bk. of Leinster, 161 b, has Nia-fer as a dative.
- ↑ Parthey and Tinder's edition, pp. 224, 368.
